An otoscope is an instrument normally designed to allow a physician to peer inside an ear or into a nose through a lighted pathway. At times, particularly in infants, there are foreign bodies such as a bead or a bug within an ear or nose that necessitate removal. The objectives of this invention include low cost retrofitting of an otoscope to allow removal of foreign material including a bug from a nose and ear in a rapid patient comfortable manner.
The invention outlined in Ser. No. 09/306,210, now U.S. Pat. No. 6,001,059 includes about one eighth inch diameter flexible plastic tubing with a first end connectable to a controllable vacuum source and a second end leading to and connectable to a sidearm on the speculum in one embodiment and connectable to a sidearm on speculum extensions or retrofits in other embodiments. An insufflation port on the head of the otoscope may be partially or totally closed using finger pressure to engage or disengage the vacuum source. Normally with no external vacuum source the physician uses a small air bulb and finger pressure to vibrate the tympanic membrane in the inner ear to determine if there is fluid behind the tympanic membrane. In the invention size of the insufflation port and control of the vacuum source are such that with the insufflation port totally open there is essentially no vacuum in the otoscope. This continuation-in-part invention includes embodiments of the retrofitting units for attachment to the speculum receptacle or holder of the otoscope wherein the user without use of vacuum may manually pull a lever to partially close the ends of the retrofit units to hold a foreign body such as a bug in the tip of the retrofit unit for removal.
Minor changes to the speculum or the speculum retrofit units of the otoscope would be easily made but would be within the purview of the invention. We wish to be limited only to the spirit and purpose as outlined in these specifications and claims.